


The London Blitz

by Hk56217



Series: Original Stories [1]
Category: Original Work
Genre: Fiction, Historical, London, Original Story - Freeform, The Blitz, World War II, historical fiction - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-01-04
Updated: 2019-01-04
Packaged: 2019-10-04 07:42:46
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,747
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17300582
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Hk56217/pseuds/Hk56217
Summary: The shelter shook as the bombs fell. I could hear the air raid sirens going, even with the bombs falling. I was huddling in the corner of the shelter, with my older sisters arm over my back, holding me close, and I could see my mother curled up across the shelter with my baby sister, Caroline, and older brother, William. Our father left for the war, and there were raids almost every night~~~~~This is fiction. The events are real, but I made up the characters for a school assignment. The information in this is from multiple sites, and (hopefully) historically accurate.





	The London Blitz

The shelter shook as the bombs fell. I could hear the air raid sirens going, even with the bombs falling. I was huddling in the corner of the shelter, with my older sisters arm over my back, holding me close, and I could see my mother curled up across the shelter with my baby sister, Caroline, and older brother, William. Our father left for the war, and there were raids almost every night.

“Susan!” My mother called over the noises to my older sister, “Be careful!” Susan nodded and pulled me closer. We tucked our heads together, and I drifted off to sleep.

When I woke up, I was back in my bed, and the sun was peeking through a sliver in the curtains. My family had taken to keeping the curtains shut all the time, since at night, we couldn’t have light escaping through the window, in order to prevent our family’s house from becoming a target. I sat up, rubbing my eyes. Across the room, William was pulling his shirt on. William turned around, noticing that I was awake.

“Hey Thomas,” he said quietly. I gave him a small smile while dragging myself out of bed.

“Is Suzy up yet?” I asked my 11 year old brother, who shrugged in response. We were quite for a few minutes while I started to get dressed.

“Do you think dad will send me a birthday present?” The older boy asked, to which I responded with a nod.

“Dad never forgets our birthdays! Of course he’ll send something!” I finished getting my clothes on, and we headed downstairs to the kitchen. It was the 18th of January, 1941, and William’s birthday was January 19th. Our father, Richard Smith, was drafted into the war just before the bombings started, which was on September 7th, 1940. The bombs were mostly targeting the East End of London, which was where my family lived. The bombs had been coming every single night for about two months, and our family was terrified. We had only had gotten about 10 letters from our father in the months he was gone, and we were all worried about him.

My parents, Richard and Helen Smith had 4 kids, two girls and two boys. Both of their fathers had died in the First World War, which was how the two had met and bonded. Their oldest, Susan, was 14 and a half years old, while William, the next oldest, would be turning 12 the next day. Next was me, Thomas, who, at the time, was 7 years and 7 months old, while the youngest, Caroline, was almost a year and a half.

I was brought out of my thoughts by Caroline’s crying. Susan was already in the kitchen eating, while our mother was feeding Caroline, who didn’t seem to want to eat. My brother and I scarfed down our food, which was only a few slices of toast, and a tiny bit of butter, since it was one of the foods that were rationed. We were excited for the day, since we usually went out with the neighbor kids to look for shrapnel - which was almost like a currency for us kids. Since it was Saturday, we planned on being out all morning looking for shrapnel. Our plan was foiled when Will looked outside, and saw snow everywhere. We stayed inside that day.

It ended up snowing for three days, which, for the us and everyone else we lived around, was a blessing. The Germans couldn’t fly over London, which meant they couldn’t bomb us, giving the everyone a break from the destruction that the war had brought. By the time the storm let up, my older siblings and I were back in school. We went to our classes like usual, and had a few practice air raid drills during the day. There were two drills that were practiced: one with gas masks and one where everyone move to a safe spot. There was an older student who would go to each classroom and do one of two signals. One would tell us to put our gas masks on as quickly as possible, but still resume our normal classes, while the other was for when we would have to grab our gas masks and move to a safer location.

That night, we fell asleep in our rooms, Will and I in our shared room, while Susan and Caroline shared with our mother. Before our father left, Will, Caroline, and I shared a room, while Caroline slept in our parents room. We were woken up for the first time in about 4 days by the air raid sirens, and we bolted down the stairs to the Anderson shelter. That night, the bombs were closer to our house. When we left the shelter that morning, all of the windows in our house had been blown in, covering the floors in glass, making us unable to walk inside without shoes. Since it was the middle of January, our mother realized that we couldn’t sleep in the house, as the wind blowing in the house would quickly become freezing. The next couple weeks went by, with us going into the the shelter every night.

My 8th birthday was February 13th, which was when our home life changed. The nightly bombings had been seemingly getting closer to our street. The three of us went to school like usual, but when we got home, we noticed that almost every single blanket we had in our house was in the shelter. When questioned, our mother had responded, “We’re going to be spending our nights in there from now on. It’s safer that way.” Now, she was a no-nonsense woman, so we didn’t share to argue. That night, we grabbed everything we wanted to bring to bed, and went into the shelter. During the day, she had managed to make the previously terrifying shelter into almost a tiny home. There was a bed on one side, and a bunk bed on the other. The side of the regular bed furthest from the entrance had four pillows making a large rectangle. When we got to the shelter, our mother went first, setting Caroline down in the rectangle. Next, she helped me down, setting me on the other end of the bed. Will and Susan were next, and the door was pulled shut behind them, filling the room with darkness.

“You two will be sharing the bottom bunk,” mum said, lighting the small lamp that was in the shelter, to which Susan let out a noise of protest, which was silenced with one look from our mother. In the past, Susan had gotten the top bunk, while Will and I shared the bottom one, with Caroline and our mother on the bed. Against the wall next to Caroline was a small shelf, that had a first aid kit, a lamp, and a lot of other trinkets, such as pictures of our father, our family together before the war, and other family heirlooms.

My siblings and I got into bed, and our mother put out the light. I heard her crawl onto the top bunk, and I heard my siblings shifting around on their bed to get comfortable. I fell asleep to the sound of Caroline’s soft snores and the squeak of the bunks as my older siblings and mother shifted in their sleep.

I woke up to the sound of the air raid siren going off, and soon after came the sound of engines of the _Luftwaffe_ planes. Lastly, the bombs. They were louder than the previous days, which terrified me. I heard Caroline crying, so I crawled over to her, got into the nest mum had made for her, and held her. The shelter was pitch black, so I couldn’t see any of my family. There were loud thuds on the roof of the shelter, which we later found out was caused by shrapnel hitting the dirt above the roof of the shelter. I felt drops of water hit my face, falling from the roof because the ground was shaking. Caroline’s crying was reduced to whimpers. Suddenly, we couldn’t hear the planes. There were no more bombs, and all that I heard was Caroline’s soft whimpering. On my 8th birthday fell asleep with my baby sister clinging to me.

Sleeping in the shelter became routine for us. We ate dinner in the house, changed, then went to the shelter for the night. There were bombs every night, some closer and some further. The worst night, however, was the night of May 10th, 1941. That night would become one that I would never forget.

Our mother was next door with Caroline, spending the night. Will, Susan, and I all had a small stomach bug, and mum didn’t want to risk Caroline getting sick, and Susan was old enough to watch over us for the night. The three of us had the small lamp on, and were sitting on one of the beds playing. At 11:00 that night, the sirens went off. I ended up falling asleep first, with my older siblings soon after. That night, I would later learn, that around 711 tons of high explosive bombs, along with around 86,173 incendiaries were dropped, killing about 1436 people, and injuring more. Among the dead were some of my neighbors and friends, and my mother, Helen, and baby sister, Caroline. We were sent to live with our fathers sister and her husband in the countryside afterwards. Susan was the only one who had met them, but that was when she was little, before William. About a week after mum and Caroline had died, our father came home. It had been over 6 months since we had seen him, and the reunion was full of tears from the four of us left.

We stayed in the countryside for the rest of the war, since our house had been destroyed the night our mum and sister died. The months after they died were blurred together for me. We never went back to living in London. After the war, we moved to Bristol, and started a new life. Will, Susan, and I went to a better school, and our dad got a better job. As I grew older, I forgot my mother’s voice, but I would never forget what she or Caroline looked like; a family photo from before the Blitz sat in a picture frame at my bedside.

**Author's Note:**

> Let me know what you think! 
> 
> Again, this is a work of fiction, and all the characters in the story are made from mine and my friends brains.


End file.
